Monday, August 24, 2009

The Secret Ingredient

Since past few weeks I have been thinking a lot about random stuff. Totally random and often useless. But of all the randomness, I have been thinking about the Secret Ingredient of success. The stuff that enabled them build corporational empires and castles. How do they do it? They were never brilliant in their school! Then how did they do it? Big politicians and rich businessmen! Some of them do not even know how to speak in public. Was it their luck? Or was it their ancestors?

Whatever it was, I still have not found the answer. I may never find the answer. But this secret may make go crazy. I am getting insane. How to? How to? How to?

How to beat these people? How to???

Friday, August 14, 2009

Past Memories, Unforgettable!

I still remember!

"Hey, I will call you in a while when I get back home, I think my workers are having fireworks in the rally. Bubye."

I remember when my mom left home and I turned on the television to see a RED ALERT NEWS BULLETIN saying: A bomb blast on the rally of a candidate for elections for Member of National Assembly in the area of Parachinar.

I was thinking it couldnt be. Not possible. We just talked to my dad. His rally was over and they were having fireworks. But then the The News Bulletin said: Bomb blast on the election rally of Dr. Syed Riaz Hussain Shah NA-37.

This was enough to sweep me off my feet. The rest was history. 61 people dead and 232 injured in the Suicide Bom Blast on my father's rally after he was done with his speech. His closest workers were among the martyrs. My dad cried. He cried because he is such a guy who cannot even see an insect dead.

We all mourned for the dead but I remember what happened two weeks later. I still remember:

"Shehroz! Were you asleep? I am so sorry to hear about your dad!"

"What? What happened to him? Must be a mistake my friend."

"No No, turn on the television and watch the news. There was an attack on his life."

"I will talk to you later!"

News Bulletin: A roadside, remote-controlled bomb blew up the SUV of Dr. Syed Riaz Hussain, candidate for Member of National Assembly from NA-37. No further details.

This time I felt like I was dreaming. No one in my family knew about it as it was morning and everyone was busy with their house chores. I call on the cellphone of my father and a voice tells me that the number is powered off. I was shocked, scared, shitty, and could not even cry. I took out the power cable of the television so that no one should see the news. My mom was not home. I call her just to hear her crying because someone had told her already.

"Mamma, I saw the news. It cannot be. It is a lie. It is a mistake."

"Shehroz, then why isn't your father picking up his damn cellphone?"

"Mamma, relax, mamma we need to be careful, he must be busy. I will call his workers and ask them. Mamma, don't cry. Please mamma, I cannot handle this alone. Please mamma, keep it a secret from others till we contatct Baba. Mamma, for me, please stay strong, I am coming for you, stay there. I am coming right now!"

It took us another four hours before we talked to my father who was in the Operation Theatre after the incident. In a caravan of SUVs of my father and his workers plus guards, no one knew in which SUV my father was sitting and yet the enemy had the information. The SUVs in front had passed by the bomb and when my father's SUV approached the spot, someone with a remote control blew up the bomb. My father's guards and driver were severely injured and the SUV became a pile of rubble. They were taken to the hospital. Who could be so merciless to do such a thing to my father who never meant harm to anyone? He never even meant harm to his own enemies!

My father was injured and so were his closest workers. As one worker gave the account, he said "when we reached to the spot and were looking for your father, we saw a body full of blood. The head and face was so bloody that we thought that your father's body got separated from his head and one of the guys started screaming LOOK FOR THE HEAD LOOK FOR THE HEAD!"

Before we could get in touch with my father, people started pouring in our house. All worried. All waiting for the news. Prayers were answered and myf ather survived the second attempt on his life. But those four hours before the phone call from dad were the most difficult moments of my life. My mom crying, my brothers crying.

"I am okay son. I am okay. I am perfectly fine. I will talk to you later, right now I am going to an undisclosed location to rest. I will call you in a while again."

I will never forget that one month full of election excitement and then full of bloody depression. The memory still haunts me! Haunts me every second of my life, yet I can do nothing. You cannot even imagine!!!

When I say I HAVE SEEN THINGS AND I HAVE EXPERIENCED THINGS, I am not lying. All this changed me. Made me stronger, harder and WIERDER. I may have a friendly mask on me but I am different from inside.

Monday, August 3, 2009

The same Moon!

Sometimes, a random surge of philosophy races through yor mind and it just doesn't make sense. Well, for me this is quite often. But all this made sense to me after a while and may not make sense to you since it was something hidden deep in my heart and I had to let it out somehow so it came out in a concealed coded message! Think deeply over the following:


It is funny how some people think this moon is such a romantic object. I thought so too and had so many romantic nights just sitting under it and staring at it.

Then it is funny how you hate and blame everything when you are angry. I was angry that day and I blamed this same moon for a lot of things. But then I saw that there is a lot more to this whole shebang.

This same moon watches over the lovers of the night. But this same moon also watches over the hungry and poor of the dark, the forgotten.

This same moon watches over a baby sleeping in his craddle. But this same moon also watches over the homeless and the sick, the forgotten.

This moon watches over the lush green valleys full of life. But this moon also watches over the dead deserts, craving for for life, the forgotten.

This moon watches over all the things we know. But this moon aslo watches over all the things we forget, THE FORGOTTEN!

When the whole world is asleep and forgets that life has two sides, the good and the bad, this same moon is awake watching over what we forget! This moon is not like us humans that it forgets. We are a flawed creatures and we forget. One day we will oursleves become the FORGOTTEN and then even the moon will close its eyes on us!

The Famous Girly Laugh

"Dude, are you seriously laughing like a girl?"

"I don't know, it has never happened to me before!"

"Ozzy, you are creeping me out!"

"I never laughed so hard that it became like a girl's laughter!"

"Ozzy, stop it! Its freakin' me out! Your laughing fit is getting scary now!"

"I can't stop!"

"Ozzy, breathe, breathe! HAHAHA, you can't even breathe now!"

Oh I miss those days when I used to have those laughing fits where the final level of my laughter would be to laugh like a girl! It all started a week after I met my twin brother Marcelo. We were both ready to sleep in our beds with lights turned off that Marcelo made a small racist joke. It was a pathetic joke but I started laughing. And after about ten minutes, I reached my final level of laughter and started laughing like a girl. I just could not stop. Marcelo was scared. He got out of his bed and turned on the lights to find me lying upside down on the floor and laughing so hard that my face was red and eyes wet and popping out! He had to slap me to get me back to my senses! And after that my girly laugh became famous in the whole school as well as everywhere else. I would laugh in school, in car, in gym, in pool, on road, in bus...EVERYWHERE!

"Hey just wait, Ozzy is gonna laugh like a girl now!"

Oh only Marcelo could make me laugh like that! No one has ever been able to do that. None of my friends who I knew since birth could do that. Even I never knew that I could laugh so hard. I had never reached the full potential of my laugh to see that it is a GIRLY LAUGH!

Ever since I came back, I have not been able to laugh. THE REAL ACTUAL UNFAKE LAUGH. I have yet to experience that in Pakistan. I wish I could laugh again among all these miseries. I wish I could laugh again like a girl and have the time of my life. I still regret accidently deleting a video in which Marcelo recorded me laughing like a girl. Alas! Those days are gone. I have always been known as the SERIOUS SHEHROZ WHO MINDS HIS OWN BUSINESS. But only my true friends in America knew that THIS SERIOUS SHEHROZ is just a mask. OZZY'S LAUGH MAKES US LAUGH!

That is when it became clear to me that SHEHROZ HAS BEEN TRANSFORMED TO OZZY. And when I came back to Pakistan, OZZY'S EXISTENCE BECAME IMPOSSIBLE.

Marcelo, I wish I had known you my whole life; I would have been such a different person. Marcelo, I wish God had made you my ACTUAL twin brother. Marcelo, I wish you were here right now to make me laugh. I MISS LAUGHING. THE REAL ACTUAL UNFAKE LAUGH. THE GIRLY LAUGH.

Saturday, August 1, 2009

ME ME ME & Friends

Ever since I landed in this God forsaken country, I have been faced with one sarcastic remark after another.

"Now you have changed"
"You were better before"
"So wierd"
"Mr. Flirt"
"What happened to you?"
"Hey this is Pakistan now!"

And all I could say to myself was FUCK IT! Yes! Fuck everything! I do not fucking give a shit about anything!

All my friends who I trusted with my life came out to be fake. BLOODY ASSHOLES! I would have given my life for them for I am not afraid of death (if you knew). I am not afraid of death but these fake friends gave me a thousand deaths. If I have changed for them, then don't they even love me to accept me no matter how different I am? Can't they understand that people change? Well, I am what I am and that is enough for me.